by Askari
According to eyewitness accounts, Gervin Moreno was seen walking into the house moments before the shooting erupted, and was seen leaving the house immediately after with the crying infant cradled in his arms. The murder weapon, a .357 Magnum, was discovered at the scene and, according to the authorities, Mr. Moreno’s fingerprints were successfully lifted from the gun. His bloody fingerprints were also discovered on the clothes line that was used to tie up the victims.
Despite this incriminating evidence, after a two month long trial, the jury acquitted Mr. Moreno on all charges, and aside from the fact that the witness was murdered prior to trial, the district attorney is claiming that Mr. Moreno tampered with the jury and that the verdict was fixed.
Detective Sullivan was ecstatic. “You son-of-a-bitch,” he exclaimed. “The missing kid, he’s Agent Long. DEA Agent Terrance Long is Terrance Moreno. He’s Grip’s nephew.”
He Googled the name Terrance Moreno, but nothing came up. “Come on, you motherfucker, I know you have to be in here somewhere.” He knew that in order for people to believe him, he would need unequivocal proof. Otherwise, his assertion would only amount to conjecture. Determined to bolster his position, he clicked on a website that specialized in background checks, and punched in the two names.
As he sat there waiting for the information to process, the unexpected happened. And for the first time, he wished that he’d taken Rebecca’s advice when it came to decorating his office.
“Didn’t anybody ever tell you not to sit with your back to the door?”
The warmth of the intruder’s voice caressed the peach fuzz on his left earlobe. The phonemic of the voice was husky and deep, and the smell of menthol rolled off the tip of his tongue. Detective Sullivan slowly removed his hand from the mouse and stoically looked at the monitor, careful not to make any moves that would get the noodles knocked out of his noggin. The feeling of cold steel against the right side of his neck was enough to let him know that shit was real.
“What are you doing in my house, Terry?” He had no doubts whatsoever pertaining to the intruder’s identity.
Gangsta cocked a bullet into the chamber and pressed the tip of the silencer to the back of his wig.
“Sshhh.” He continued to whisper in Sullivan’s ear. “We wouldn’t want to wake up the wife and kid, now would we?”
At the mention of Rebecca and Chelsey, Sullivan became defensive, immediately fearing for the safety of his family. Realizing he had to do something to protect them, his eyes scoured the top of his desk looking for something that he could possibly use as a weapon. To the left of his 19-inch monitor, he spotted the 10X12 picture of him, Rebecca, and Chelsey. It was the same exact picture they used to grace the front of their holiday greeting cards. Dressed in red and green sweaters and standing in front of a decorated Christmas tree, the young family looked as though they didn’t have a care in the world. The light from the hallway shimmered off of the picture frame and Sullivan caught a glimpse of Gangsta. A black handgun that was equipped with a two-inch silencer was clutched in his right hand, and he was standing directly behind him.
“You really don’t have to do this, Terry.” He was talking through clinched teeth and doing his best to bide some time, hoping that Gangsta would slip up and give him the opportunity he needed to protect his family.
“Sure I do,” Gangsta replied, still whispering in his left ear. “You know too much, so for me to even consider letting you live, I’d be trading my life for yours, and obviously that’s not an option.”
“Aren’t you tired of this shit, Terry?”
“Tired of what?” Gangsta asked with a raised brow.
“How does it feel, Terry?” Sullivan raised his voice a few octaves, attempting to play with Gangsta’s psyche.
“What the fuck are you talking about, Sully?” Gangsta shot back and tightened his grip on the P89. He knew that he was doing way too much talking, but before he killed his mark he needed to know the extent of Sullivan’s information and the names of the people that he shared it with.
“How does it feel, Terry? I want you tell me.”
“Pussy, what the fuck are you talking about?”
“The feeling of knowing that the same motherfucker who turned you into a monster was the same motherfucker who murdered your parents back in ‘74.”
Gangsta was stunned. He was expecting to hear some off the wall bullshit, but the allegation that Grip was the one who murdered his parents was so left field that he honestly didn’t know how to respond. “Yo, what the fuck are you talking about, Sully?”
“I’m talking about Grip. That rotten motherfucker murdered your parents and now he’s manipulating you into doing his dirty work,” Detective Sullivan quickly replied. He wasn’t sure how long his psychological game would last, but he had to make the best of it.
“That’s bullshit,” Gangsta vehemently stated. “Uncle G didn’t kill my folks, the Italians did.”
Detective Sullivan laughed at him. “The Italians? Is that what he told you? Was that the battery that he placed in your back? That black-hearted motherfucker killed your parents and I can prove it.”
“Prove it?” Gangsta questioned with a screwed up face. “How the fuck can you prove something that never happened?”
“All you have to do is tap the mouse,” Sullivan insisted. The screen saver of him, Rebecca, and Chelsey was bouncing across the screen, but with the click of the mouse Gangsta was in for a rude awakening. “I’ve got the news article from February 8th, 1975, the day after Grip was acquitted for the murders of your parents. He was arrested and tried for the crimes, but somehow he managed to pay off the jury and they let him walk.”
The look on Gangsta’s face was nothing short of incredulous. He fixed his eyes on the screen saver, and said, “Mutha’fucka you better not be lying.”
“I’m telling you the God honest truth,” Sullivan propounded.
Gangsta started to reach for the mouse with his left hand, but he pulled it back. “Nah, mutha’fucka, you click on the mouse, and I swear to God, if you’re lying to me I’ma fuck ya wife in the ass and make you watch.”
Detective Sullivan took a deep breath and released a long sigh. Slowly, carefully, he reached for the mouse and clicked the button. The results of his background check popped up on the screen, so he clicked the backwards arrow in the top right corner and the news article appeared on the screen. “There’s your proof.”
With the lips of the silencer still pressed against Sullivan’s neck, Gangsta leaned forward and meticulously read the article. He couldn’t believe his eyes. Everything that Sullivan was saying was right before him in black and white. Not only was Grip charged in the murders of his parents, the evidence against him appeared to be overwhelming.
Detective Sullivan breathed deeply, realizing that this was the moment he’d been waiting for. Gangsta was so caught up in reading the article that he wasn’t paying him any mind. But, just as he was about to make his move, he noticed something in the bottom left corner of the picture frame. It was Chelsey. She was standing in the doorway, dressed in her Sponge Bob pajamas set, and wiping the sleep out of her eyes. Her favorite teddy bear, Mr. Fluffy, was dangling from her right hand and Sullivan could tell that she had the slightest idea that an intruder was in the midst of their home.
“Daddy, can I have a glass of warm milk? I can’t sleep.”
Her squeaky little voice caught Gangsta by surprise. “What the fuck?” He turned to look in her direction and Sullivan made his move. He hopped to his feet and punched Gangsta in the stomach with a short left hook.
“Chelsey, run.”
The little girl released a piercing scream as Gangsta nearly dropped to his knees. He desperately tried to recover from the unexpected blow, but Sullivan was already digging in his ass. His left hand was raining blows on the right side of Gangsta’s face and his right hand was struggling to rip the P89 from his grasp.
“Aaaagggghhhhh,” Chelsey continued screaming. “Daddy, stop.”
“Pussy, get up off me,” Gangsta snarled at him, returning a couple of blows in the process, warming up the detective’s rib cage. They tumbled around the small office, knocking over every single item that they came in contact with. Gangsta was forty something pounds heavier, but it didn’t show. Detective Sullivan was a man on a mission and, with the safety of his family hanging in the balance, he fought with the intensity of a Roman gladiator. His right hand nearly had the gun ripped away from Gangsta’s hand, but a solid hook to the bridge of his nose knocked him backwards. The velocity of his tumbling body pulled the P89 loose and the pistol fell on top of a stack of papers. Hungrily, they both dove for the gun, savagely fighting for its possession. Gangsta had his hands wrapped around the silencer and Sullivan had his left hand wrapped around the wood grain handle.
“Daddy, stop fighting,” Chelsey continued to scream. “Aaaagggghhhhh.”
In a twist of fate, Sullivan managed to slip his index finger inside of the trigger guard. Still struggling for possession, he aimed the barrel to the best of his ability, and let off a shot.
Pfft.
The bullet sliced through Gangsta’s right arm like a hot knife to a block of government cheese. He stumbled backwards and fell to the floor, clutching his wound.
Chelsey stopped screaming. Confused, she looked at the red circle that embellished the front of her shirt, and then looked up, and gazed into her father’s brown eyes. In a soft, innocent voice, she said, “Daddy, it’s burning.”
Sullivan shrieked like a wounded bear. He dropped the God-forsaken piece of metal, and ran towards her, catching her body in the crook of his arms just before she hit the carpet. “Chelsey,” he shouted. “Oh my God. Chelsey, no.”
As he frantically ripped the front of her Sponge Bob shirt and examined the gunshot wound to her solar plexus, Rebecca emerged from their bed room and stepped into the hallway. “Ronald,” she pronounced his name with a whiny undertone. “What the hell is going on out here? Why is she making so much noise?”
She wiped the sleep out of her eyes and looked closely. Her daughter was covered in blood, and her husband was begging the little girl to wake up. “Chelsey?” She mumbled before screaming, “Chelsey.” She placed her right hand over her heart, and then ran down the hallway at top speed. She snatched the girl away from her father and held her like a newborn baby. “Chelsey,” she whispered in her ear. “Wake up, baby, please.”
When Chelsey failed to respond and her head lolled to the side, Rebecca went into a frenzy. Violently, she shook her daughter like a rag doll, attempting to bring her back to life, but it wasn’t working. Her beautiful, sweet, innocent Chelsey was dead at the tender age of six and there was nothing she could do to change it.
Sullivan was devastated. He was so caught up in grieving for his little girl that he forgot about Gangsta. His wife was screaming bloody murder, asking God “why,” and the both of them were covered in the warm blood of their only child.
“Damnit,” Gangsta groaned as he slowly got up from the floor. Clutching his arm, he looked at the grieving family, and then spotted the P89 lying on the carpet. When he reached down to pick it up, a stream of blood dripped down his arm, trickled off the tips of his fingers, and dotted the beige carpet. “Fuckin’ bitch,” he complained, instantly realizing that his DNA was all over the office.
“Ronald,” Rebecca sobbed, “what the hell happened to her?”
Her words snapped him out of his trance, and he remembered that Gangsta was lying on the floor behind him. He spun around and reached for the P89, but it was too late.
Pfft. Pfft. Pfft.
The bullets collapsed the back of his melon like a deflated football, burst out the side of his forehead, and left Rebecca with a face full of blood. It happened so fast that initially she couldn’t understand why the weight of his dead body had her pinned to the hallway floor. Completely stunned, she used the back of her right hand to wipe the blood out of her eyes, and then looked up to see Gangsta standing there with the smoking gun clutched in his right hand.
“No,” she cried out. “Jesus, please.”
Pfft. Pfft.
The bullets ripped through her eyeballs, replacing them with bloody red marbles. Her body convulsed, and then slowly, peacefully, abruptly came to a stop.
“Damn,” Gangsta sighed. He was shaking his head and regretfully looking down at the human sandwich. Rebecca was on the bottom, Chelsey was wedged in the middle, and Sullivan was lying on top. “Damn,” he repeated. The last thing he ever wanted to do was kill an innocent woman and child, but in the same vein, he understood that sometimes you can’t avoid the unexpected. Looking at the blood that was dripping from his right hand, he continued shaking his head from left to right. “Fuck, man. Now, I gotta burn these mutha’fuckas up. Damn.”
Chapter Fifteen
A black 2014 Chevy Impala was parked up the block from Sonny’s Upper Dublin estate, and Arnold Troutman, the lead investigator for Savino and Associates, was sitting behind the steering wheel. His Apple iPad was downloading the video footage from his dash-cam, and he was looking at Daphney through a pair of night-vision goggles. “Mmm mmm mmm,” the skinny white man said to himself, and then took a bite of his roast beef and provolone on rye. “Talk about making a bad situation worse.” Unbeknownst to Daphney, the top notch investigator had been watching and recording her every move for the past three hours.
His assignment began earlier that evening when he received a text message from Sonny stating that he needed an extra pair of eyes to watch over his family. Troutman was fully aware of the ambush at Easy’s funeral, and he quickly offered his assistance. He’d been working for Sonny for the past year and a half, and just a couple of weeks ago, Sonny paid him $10,000 for tracking down Mexican Bobby, so obviously he was eager to make a fast buck. After strapping on his bullet-proof vest and loading up his 9mm, he packed a couple of sandwiches, filled up his coffee thermos, and headed out the door.
Upon his arrival, he noticed that Sonny was driving up the block in his Porsche Spyder, so he activated his dome light, flashed his high beams, and rolled down his window. The gray car pulled up beside his Impala, and the tinted driver’s side window retracted into the bullet-proof door.
“Sontino, I’m locked and loaded,” Troutman said, and then held up the black 9mm that was lying on his lap.
Sonny nodded his approval, then reached inside of his glove compartment and grabbed the white envelope that was lying beside a pack of Backwoods. He handed the envelope to Troutman, and the skinny white man stuffed it inside of his jacket pocket.
“It’s $15,000 inside of the envelope,” Sonny told him. “I paid you an extra $5,000 for taking the job on such a short notice.”
Troutman smiled at him. “Thanks Sontino.”
“Don’t even mention it,” Sonny said as he waved him off. “But, listen, I gotta make a few runs, so all I need you to do is stay on point. And if anybody, Trout, I mean anybody, comes to my house other than me or the twins, they’re an enemy.”
“I’m ready to rock and roll, Sontino, trust me. But just so I know, exactly who am I watching out for?” Troutman asked.
“My wife and kids,” Sonny informed him. “My mom and grandmom were supposed to have been here too, but they left a little while ago.”
“So noted,” Troutman confirmed as he gently caressed the top of his pistol. “Now, as far as your wife, does she know that I’m here?”
“Naw.” Sonny shook his head. “That shouldn’t even matter because her and the kids are done for the night, and they ain’t got no business leavin’ the house. All I need you to do is keep your eyes open, and remember what I said about a mutha’fucka comin’ to my house. If it ain’t me or the twins, they’re an enemy, and I’m expectin’ you to handle that shit accordingly.”
“Absolutely,” Troutman assured him.
He stuck his right hand out of the window and embraced Sonny with a firm handshake. “Don’t you worry about a thing, Sontino. I’ve got it covered.”
“More or less,” Sonny replied, and then reached under the passenger’s seat and pulled out a black FNH .45 and two extended clips. “Here.” He handed the pistol and the two ladders to Troutman. “Just in case shit get real, you can hold it down accordingly. Because that punk ass nine you packin’ ain’t gon’ do nothin’ but make a mutha’fucka mad.”
Troutman chuckled. “All right, Sontino, whatever you say.”
“More or less,” Sonny replied, wrapping up the conversation. The only thing on his mind was getting back to the hospital to check on Rahmello. He nodded at Troutman, giving him a look that conveyed a clear cut warning, and then pulled off slowly.
As Troutman sat there examining the massive handgun, the bright lights on the front of Daphney’s Benz illuminated the block as the SUV emerged from behind the stone wall and drove towards him. He started to flag her down, but decided to remain incognito as he thought about Sonny’s words. Her and the kids are done for the night, and they ain’t got no business leavin’ the house. Hoping that Daphney wouldn’t see him as she drove by, he crouched down in the driver’s seat and waited for the SUV to cruise past him. When it reached the corner and made a right turn, he brought the Impala back to life and followed the Benz truck from a safe distance.
That was three hours ago, and during that time, he collected enough video footage to prove that a double cross was in full effect. After dropping the kids off at a house in Uptown Philly, she drove to the Bad Landz and linked up with Egypt. They drove around aimlessly, then pulled over on a dark block, and made the SUV rock back and forth, clearly indicating that they were engaging in sexual activity. After that, they drove to Sonny’s stash house and loaded the back of the SUV with large quantities of cocaine, and then traveled to Egypt’s trap house where they unloaded the work, and spent a total of forty minutes inside of the house doing only God knows what.
